Full stop missing on child abuse

Hidden away in a dense, well-researched report into the causes and consequences of child abuse published last week is an intriguing and potentially explosive challenge to Britain's most successful charity fundraising campaigners. The NSPCC's Full Stop campaign, which closed earlier this year having raised over £250m since its launch in 1999, is generally regarded as a wonder of the age. But what, the report asks, might we realistically expect this huge marshalling of public generosity and cash to achieve, in terms of its explicit aim of ending child cruelty?

The answer, suggests the report by New Philanthropy Capital (NPC), is not a lot. Campaigning to change public attitudes and keep abuse on the radar, as NSPCC does with some success, has its place, but there is zero evidence that this leads to fewer beatings. The logic behind Full Stop, it argues, is flawed and naive: "Improved attitudes to abuse can certainly facilitate the identification and reporting of abuse that is already occurring, but they seem to have very little bearing on whether a substance-abusing parent neglects their child behind closed doors, or whether a sexual offender chooses to abuse a child when they have the opportunity to do so in secret."

It is not the first time Full Stop has come under scrutiny, and the charity has weathered past criticisms of its fundraising methods, with no discernable effect on its reputation or balance sheet.

But this report is of a different order. NPC is an independent charity that analyses charity performance in social welfare, on behalf of wealthy donors. Its reports make recommendations about which charities donors should give to to achieve the best social returns on investment. It brokers around £1m a month in donor funds, and advises companies on where to direct their charitable giving (such as the Guardian's Christmas Charity Appeal). Ministers privately speak approvingly of NPC and its attempts to separate fact from myth in the opaque world of charity performance.

NSPCC is not totally absent from NPC's list of recommended child abuse charities. ChildLine, which NSPCC absorbed through merger 18 months ago and which recently won £30m of government funding over four years, makes the cut, as does its there4me service. The report doesn't say explicitly that donors should regard Full Stop and similar campaigns as a waste of money, but makes it clear charities focusing heavily on transforming public attitudes or behaviour change should be considered low priority for charitable giving. It says there is no clear model for change, it is costly, and there is no evidence it works.

On the other hand, charities running sexual abuse helplines, for example, are scored as high priority for donors. NPC says a donor would get high social returns by investing in Eighteen and Under, a tiny Dundee-based charity that offers confidential support and information to young people who have experienced sexual, physical or emotional abuse. It has two full-time staff, an annual income of £112,000, none of NSPCC's glamour, and a fraction of the latter's £116m income. Yet it punches above its weight in a field notorious for failure to communicate with children. As the report notes, it is "quite simply, very good at listening to children".

It would be wrong to see NPC as fashionably anti-Big Charity, because it does not hesitate to recommend them where they can show they perform well. What is surprising is that so many well-known charity names cannot prove this. It will be fascinating to see how many refocus their operations to become NPC-compatible. Some will see it as a threat. It may be disruptive but the value of NPC is indisputable: it offers a more rational approach to giving - one that matches donor money with effective charities, regardless of size, brand and past glories. And it offers innovative new charities entry into a market increasingly dominated by the established big names.

The public gives £500m each year to charities tackling child abuse and it would be a tragedy if this was not well spent. NSPCC has prospered in part because it is a thoroughly modern supercharity, its selling of itself epitomised by Full Stop, exploiting brilliantly the power of media and celebrity. It will survive the NPC report, but it should regard it as a timely wake-up call- a reminder that donor money should go to what works. Everything else is marketing.

· Patrick Butler is editor of Society Guardian. Not Seen and Not Heard: Child Abuse - A Guide for Donors and Funders, is published by New Philanthropy Capital

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